91-594: Oxley Woods is a housing development in Oxley Park, a district of Milton Keynes , Buckinghamshire , England . The development was designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners and built by Newton Woods, who were subcontracted by Taylor Wimpey after winning the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister's Design for Manufacture Competition, which was run by English Partnerships in 2005. John Prescott ,
182-636: A Peace Pagoda , which was built in 1980 and was the first built by the Nipponzan-Myōhōji Buddhist Order in the western world. The original Wolverton was a medieval settlement just north and west of today's town. The ridge and furrow pattern of agriculture can still be seen in the nearby fields. The 12th century (rebuilt in 1819) 'Church of the Holy Trinity' still stands next to the Norman motte and bailey site. Modern Wolverton
273-652: A campaign for a "Bigger, Better, Brighter, Bletchley" . As the nation emerged from World War II, Bletchley Council renewed its desire to expand from its 1951 population of 10,919. By mid-1952, the council was able to agree terms with five London Boroughs to accept people and businesses from bombed-out sites in London. This trend continued through the 1950s and 1960s, culminating in the GLC-funded Lakes Estate in Water Eaton parish, even as Milton Keynes
364-506: A completely new hill-top site four miles further north, halfway to Wolverton. Bletchley was relegated to the status of suburb. Bletchley thrived in the early years of the growth of Milton Keynes, since it was the main shopping area. Bletchley centre was altered considerably when the Brunel Shopping Centre was built in the early 1970s, creating a new end to Queensway. (Previously, Queensway – formerly known as Bletchley Road –
455-606: A further generation of new towns in the South East of England was needed to relieve housing congestion in London. Since the 1950s, overspill housing for several London boroughs had been constructed in Bletchley . Further studies in the 1960s identified north Buckinghamshire as a possible site for a large new town, a new city, encompassing the existing towns of Bletchley, Stony Stratford , and Wolverton . The New Town (informally and in planning documents, 'New City')
546-756: A golf course and a farm". The Grand Union Canal is another green route (and demonstrates the level geography of the area – there is just one minor lock in its entire 10-mile (16 km) meandering route through from the southern boundary near Fenny Stratford to the "Iron Trunk" aqueduct over the Ouse at Wolverton at its northern boundary). The initial park system was planned by Peter Youngman (Chief Landscape Architect ), who also developed landscape precepts for all development areas: groups of grid squares were to be planted with different selections of trees and shrubs to give them distinct identities. The detailed planning and landscape design of parks and of
637-401: A grid-road bus-stop. Consequently, each grid square is a semi-autonomous community, making a unique collective of 100 clearly identifiable neighbourhoods within the overall urban environment. The grid squares have a variety of development styles, ranging from conventional urban development and industrial parks to original rural and modern urban and suburban developments. Most grid squares have
728-413: A key element of the planners' vision, Milton Keynes has a purpose built centre, with a very large "covered high street" shopping centre, a theatre , municipal art gallery , a multiplex cinema , hotels, central business district , an ecumenical church , Milton Keynes Civic Offices and central railway station . Campbell Park , a formal park extending east from the business area to
819-449: A local centre, intended as a retail hub, and many have community facilities as well. Each of the original villages is the heart of its own grid-square. Originally intended under the master plan to sit alongside the grid roads, these local centres were mostly in fact built embedded in the communities. Although the 1970 master plan assumed cross-road junctions, roundabout junctions were built at intersections because this type of junction
910-522: A programme of intensive planting, balancing lakes and parkland. Central Milton Keynes ("CMK") was not intended to be a traditional town centre but a central business and shopping district to supplement local centres embedded in most of the grid squares. This non-hierarchical devolved city plan was a departure from the English new towns tradition and envisaged a wide range of industry and diversity of housing styles and tenures. The largest and almost
1001-638: A shortfall that the Council aims to rectify. In January 2019, the council and its partner, Cranfield University, invited proposals to design a campus near the Central station for a new university, code-named MK:U . However this project seems unlikely to proceed, following a government decision in January 2023 to deny funding. In June 2023, the Open University announced that it would "initiate work on
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#17327802191811092-550: A total of 3,000 – 4,500 children. A central resource area served all the schools on a campus. In addition, each campus included a leisure centre with indoor and outdoor sports facilities and a swimming pool, plus a theatre. These facilities were available to the public outside school hours, thus maximising use of the investment. Changes in central government policy from the 1980s onwards subsequently led to much of this system being abandoned. Some schools have since been merged and sites sold for development, many converted to academies, and
1183-533: A unique insight into the history of a large sample of the landscape of North Buckinghamshire. The corporation's strongly modernist designs were regularly featured in the magazines Architectural Design and the Architects' Journal . MKDC was determined to learn from the mistakes made in the earlier new towns , and revisit the garden city ideals . They set in place the characteristic grid roads that run between districts ( 'grid squares' ), as well as
1274-419: A very strong north-south axis. If you've got to build a city between (them), it is very natural to take a pen and draw the rungs of a ladder. Ten miles by six is the size of this city – 22,000 acres. Do you lay it out like an American city, rigid orthogonal from side to side? Being more sensitive in 1966-7, the designers decided that the grid concept should apply but should be a lazy grid following
1365-579: Is a city in Buckinghamshire , England, about 50 miles (80 km) north-west of London . At the 2021 Census, the population of its urban area was 264,349. The River Great Ouse forms the northern boundary of the urban area; a tributary, the River Ouzel , meanders through its linear parks and balancing lakes . Approximately 25% of the urban area is parkland or woodland and includes two Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). In
1456-477: Is composed of about 90% service industries and 9% manufacturing. It may startle some political economists to talk of commencing the building of new cities ... planned as cities from their first foundation, and not mere small towns and villages. ... A time will arrive when something of this sort must be done ... England cannot escape from the alternative of new city building. In the 1960s, the UK government decided that
1547-531: Is in the parliamentary constituency of Milton Keynes South. For the 2011 census, the Office for National Statistics designated a "built up area sub-division", being that part of Milton Keynes that is west of the A5 and south of the A421 , some 1,073.5 hectares (2,652.7 acres). At the 2011 census, the population of the area was 37,114. For the 2001 census, it designated a (larger) "urban sub-area" that approximates to
1638-494: Is located on South Terrace, just east of V7 Saxon Street in Central Bletchley. MK City Council also operates an on demand bus service known as "MK Connect", which serves the whole MK unitary authority area, including Bletchley. Bletchley has a football club, Milton Keynes Irish and a rugby union club, Bletchley RUFC , both of which play at Manor Fields just south of Fenny Stratford. Bletchley Leisure Centre
1729-478: Is more commonly known as the city. Labour Minister Dick Crossman …looked at [a] map and saw [the] name and said " Milton the poet , Keynes the economic one . 'Planning with economic sense and idealism, a very good name for it.'" Jock Campbell, Baron Campbell of Eskan The name 'Milton Keynes' was a reuse of the name of one of the original historic villages in the designated area, now more generally known as ' Milton Keynes Village ' to distinguish it from
1820-541: Is more efficient at dealing with small to medium volumes. Some major roads are dual carriageway , the others are single carriageway . Along one side of each single carriageway grid road, there is usually a (grassed) reservation to permit dualling or additional transport infrastructure at a later date. As of 2018 , this has been limited to some dualling. The edges of each grid square are landscaped and densely planted – some additionally have noise attenuation mounds – to minimise traffic noise from
1911-417: Is only a small medieval chapel and a manor house occupying the site. New Bradwell , to the north of Bradwell and east of Wolverton, was built specifically for railway workers. The level bed of the old Wolverton to Newport Pagnell Line near here has been converted to a redway, making it a favoured route for cycling. A working windmill is sited on a hill outside the village. Great Linford appears in
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#17327802191812002-417: Is so called because it is generally surfaced with red tarmac. The national Sustrans national cycle network routes 6 and 51 take advantage of this system. The original design guidance declared that commercial building heights in the centre should not exceed six storeys, with a limit of three storeys for houses (elsewhere), paraphrased locally as "no building taller than the tallest tree". In contrast,
2093-668: The Deputy Prime Minister announced the competition to construct a home for around £60,000 on 26 September 2004. 53 firms/consortiums submitted pre-qualifying questionnaire by the deadline of 13 May 2005. On 1 June 2005, John Prescott announced that 33 firms had been invited to take part in the Design for Manufacture Competition to design and construct homes on 10 sites in England. They would be invited to submit firm proposals by July 2005. The Design for Manufacture Competition
2184-534: The Domesday Book as Linforde , and features a church dedicated to Saint Andrew , dating from 1215. Today, the outer buildings of the 17th century manor house form an arts centre . Milton Keynes (Village) is the original village to which the New Town owes its name. The original village is still evident, with a pleasant thatched pub , village hall , church and traditional housing. The area around
2275-667: The English Civil War (17c) onwards. The arrival of the London and Birmingham Railway (now part of the West Coast Main Line ) from 1838, and particularly of the branch lines to Bedford (1846) and Buckingham (1850) (that together subsequently became the Oxford – Cambridge " Varsity Line "), made the station at Bletchley a substantial one. Bletchley grew to eclipse both its antecedents. Almost forty years after
2366-535: The Great Ouse and of its tributaries (the Ouzel and some brooks) have been protected as linear parks that run right through Milton Keynes; these were identified as important landscape and flood-management assets from the outset. At 4,100 acres (1,650 ha) – ten times larger than London's Hyde Park and a third larger than Richmond Park – the landscape architects realised that
2457-638: The Local Government Act 1972 , Milton Keynes Borough (now City) Council). From 2004 to 2011 a government quango , the Milton Keynes Partnership , had development control powers to accelerate the growth of Milton Keynes. Along with many other towns and boroughs, Milton Keynes competed (unsuccessfully) for formal city status in the 2000, 2002 and 2012 competitions. However the Borough (including rural areas, in addition to
2548-462: The Milton Keynes Partnership , in its expansion plans for Milton Keynes , believed that Central Milton Keynes (and elsewhere) needed "landmark buildings" and subsequently lifted the height restriction for the area. As a result, high rise buildings have been built in the central business district. More recent local plans have protected the existing boulevard framework and set higher standards for architectural excellence. The flood plains of
2639-660: The Milton Keynes urban area (one inter-city). The Open University is based here and there is a small campus of the University of Bedfordshire . Most major sports are represented at amateur level; Red Bull Racing (Formula One), MK Dons (association football), and Milton Keynes Lightning (ice hockey) are its professional teams. The Peace Pagoda overlooking Willen Lake was the first such to be built in Europe. The many works of sculpture in parks and public spaces include
2730-578: The Norman conquest ; detailed archaeological investigations before development revealed evidence of human occupation from the Neolithic period, including the Milton Keynes Hoard of Bronze Age gold jewellery. The government established Milton Keynes Development Corporation (MKDC) to design and deliver this new city. The Corporation decided on a softer, more human-scaled landscape than in
2821-557: The Roman road between Dover and Wroxeter and serving Magiovinium (the Romano-British town that preceded Fenny, runs through Fenny Stratford and on through Stony Stratford). Bletchley is MK's main southern interchange point for cross-city and rural bus services. The town is served by Arriva buses 4, 5, 6, 150, F70/F77 and M6; Z&S Transport bus 50; Red Rose bus 100; and Star Travel bus 162. The town's main bus station
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2912-564: The Royal Parks model would not be appropriate or affordable and drew on their National Park experience. As Bendixson and Platt (1992) write: "They divided the Ouzel Valley into 'strings, beads and settings'. The 'strings' are well-maintained routes, be they for walking, bicycling or riding; the 'beads' are sports centres, lakeside cafes and other activity areas; the 'settings' are self-managed land-uses such as woods, riding paddocks,
3003-532: The Varsity Line . At the 2011 Census, the population of the parish was 15,313. The districts and neighbourhoods in the parish are: Church Green (including Bletchley Park ); Far Bletchley; Old Bletchley; West Bletchley (district); Whaddon (ward around Whaddon Way, not to be confused with nearby Whaddon in Aylesbury Vale ). In 1961 the parish of Bletchley had a population of 17,095. On 1 April 1974
3094-482: The civil parishes of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford and West Bletchley . In 2011, the two parishes had a combined population of 37,114. Bletchley is best known for Bletchley Park , the headquarters of Britain's World War II codebreaking organisation, and now a major tourist attraction. The National Museum of Computing is also located on the Park. The town name is Anglo-Saxon and means Blæcca's clearing . It
3185-518: The 1960s, the government decided that a further generation of new towns in the south east of England was needed to relieve housing congestion in London. Milton Keynes was to be the biggest yet, with a population of 250,000 and area of 22,000 acres (9,000 ha). At designation, its area incorporated the existing towns of Bletchley , Fenny Stratford , Wolverton and Stony Stratford , along with another fifteen villages and farmland in between. These settlements had an extensive historical record since
3276-592: The 1971 Census, the population of the Bletchley Urban District was 30,642. Proposals for a new city in North Buckinghamshire had been floated from the early 1960s. Bletchley had fought to be the centre of the proposed new city, but it was not to be. When the Milton Keynes designation order was made in 1967, Bletchley was at its southern end rather than its centre. The 1971 Plan for Milton Keynes placed Central Milton Keynes on
3367-463: The Blue Lagoon), Central Bletchley, Denbigh (including Denbigh North ), Eaton Manor, Fenny Stratford , Granby, Manor Farm, Mount Farm, Newton Leys and Water Eaton (includes "Lakes Estate"). At the 2011 Census, the population of the parish was 15,313. West Bletchley CP covers that part of Milton Keynes that is south of Standing Way ( A421 ), west of the West Coast Main Line and north of
3458-785: The Corporation attracted talented young architects, led by the respected designer, Derek Walker. In the modernist Miesian tradition is the Shopping Building designed by Stuart Mosscrop and Christopher Woodward, a grade II listed building , which the Twentieth Century Society inter alia regards as the 'most distinguished' twentieth century retail building in Britain. The Development Corporation also led an ambitious public art programme. The urban design has not been universally praised. In 1980,
3549-711: The Development Corporation was being wound up , it transferred the major parks, lakes, river-banks and grid-road margins to the Parks Trust , a charity which is independent of the municipal authority. MKDC endowed the Parks Trust with a portfolio of commercial properties, the income from which pays for the upkeep of the green spaces. As of 2018 , approximately 25% of the urban area is parkland or woodland. It includes two Sites of Special Scientific Interest , Howe Park Wood and Oxley Mead . As
3640-549: The Grand Union Canal, is described in the Pevsner Architectural Guides as " ...the largest and most imaginative park to have been laid out in Britain in the 20th century". The park is listed (grade 2) by Historic England , Milton Keynes consists of many pre-existing towns and villages that anchored the urban design, as well as new infill developments. The modern-day urban area outside
3731-540: The Green . These historical settlements were made the focal points of their respective grid square. Every other district has an historical antecedent, if only in original farms or even field names. Bletchley was first recorded in the 12th century as Blechelai . Its station was an important junction (the London and North Western Railway with the Oxford-Cambridge Varsity Line ), leading to
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3822-630: The High Street is reputedly the last place the Princes in the Tower were seen alive. The manor house of Walton village, Walton Hall , is the headquarters of the Open University and the tiny parish church (deconsecrated) is in its grounds. The small parish church (1680) at Willen was designed by the architect and physicist Robert Hooke . Nearby, there is a Buddhist Temple and
3913-562: The MK urban area ) was successful in 2022, in the Queen's Platinum Jubilee Civic Honours competition. On 15 August 2022, the Crown Office announced formally that Queen Elizabeth II had ordained by letters patent that the Borough of Milton Keynes has been given city status. In law, it is the Borough rather than its eponymous settlement that has city status; nevertheless it is the latter that
4004-731: The West Bletchley parish, in the Church Green district, is Bletchley Park , which, during the Second World War , was home to the Government Code and Cypher School . The German Enigma code was cracked here by, amongst others, Alan Turing . Another cipher machine was solved with the aid of early computing devices, known as Colossus . The park is now a museum, although many areas of the park grounds have been sold off for housing development. The nearby Wilton Hall
4095-488: The boundaries of the former Bletchley Urban District Council at the time of the designation of Milton Keynes. It also included that part of Winslow Rural District that fell within the designation. In outline, the ONS Sub-area consisted of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford Civil Parish, West Bletchley Civil Parish and part of Shenley Brook End Civil Parish (specifically Furzton, Emerson Valley, Tattenhoe and Snelshall). At
4186-582: The boundary of Milton Keynes was defined in 1967, some 40,000 people lived in four towns and fifteen villages or hamlets in the "designated area". The radical plan, form and scale of Milton Keynes attracted international attention. Early phases of development include work by celebrated architects, including Sir Richard MacCormac , Norman Foster , Henning Larsen , Ralph Erskine , John Winter , and Martin Richardson. Led by Lord Campbell of Eskan (chairman) and Fred Roche (General Manager),
4277-448: The builders, to build on Oxley Park. It was planned that a total of 145 houses would be built on the 3.26 ha (8.1 acres) site. In total there would be 11 house styles, from 2 bedroom maisonettes to five bedroom family houses. It would be a mix of affordable housing and larger private dwellings. The houses would take advantage of a range of new technologies and processes involving prefabrication and off-site assembly. This would reduce
4368-476: The city's green spaces are largely independent of the council's expenditure priorities. The Development Corporation's original design concept aimed for a "forest city" and its foresters planted millions of trees from its own nursery in Newlands in the following years. Parks, lakes and green spaces cover about 25% of Milton Keynes; as of 2018 , there are 22 million trees and shrubs in public open spaces. When
4459-492: The construction of Bletchley railway station , the 1884/5 Ordnance Survey shows Bletchley as still just a small village around the C of E parish church at Old Bletchley , and a (separate) hamlet near the Methodist chapel and Shoulder of Mutton public house at the junction of Shenley Road/ Newton Road with Buckingham Road. (These districts are known today as Old Bletchley and Far Bletchley). The major settlement of
4550-409: The construction time, but also reduce waste and energy in the transportation of materials to site. Each house would have a timber frame. The cladding panel would mean that waste was reduced to just 15% during manufacturing. The structure would take just one week to manufacture in the factory before travelling to site. The external element of the building would take just two days to form the shell, without
4641-486: The demolition of the site due to historical value, the building was sold to a new partnership in 2020 who have refurbished and reopened the building in 2022. For more details about the districts of Bletchley, see these civil parish articles. The Bletchley built-up area is divided for administrative purposes into two civil parishes, Bletchley and Fenny Stratford and West Bletchley The districts that make up Bletchley and Fenny Stratford CP are: Brickfields (includes
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#17327802191814732-430: The earlier English new towns but with an emphatically modernist architecture . Recognising how traditional towns and cities had become choked in traffic, they established a grid of distributor roads about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) between edges, leaving the spaces between to develop more organically. An extensive network of shared paths for leisure cyclists and pedestrians criss-crosses through and between them. Rejecting
4823-409: The flow of land, its valleys, its ebbs and flows. That would be nicer to look at, more economical and efficient to build, and would sit more beautifully as a landscape intervention. David Lock The Milton Keynes Development Corporation planned the major road layout according to street hierarchy principles, using a grid pattern of approximately 1 km (0.62 mi) intervals, rather than on
4914-505: The grid road impacting the adjacent grid square. Traffic movements are fast, with relatively little congestion since there are alternative routes to any particular destination other than during peak periods. The national speed limit applies on the grid roads, although lower speed limits have been introduced on some stretches to reduce accident rates. Pedestrians rarely need to cross grid roads at grade , as underpasses and bridges were specified at frequent places along each stretch of all of
5005-489: The grid roads was evolved under the leadership of Neil Higson, who from 1977 took over from Youngman. In a national comparison of urban areas by open space available to residents, Milton Keynes ranked highest in the UK. Milton Keynes is unusual in that most of the parks are owned and managed by a charity, the Milton Keynes Parks Trust rather than the local authority, to ensure that the management of
5096-415: The grid roads. In contrast, the later districts planned by English Partnerships have departed from this model, without a road hierarchy but with conventional junctions with traffic lights and at grade pedestrian crossings. There is a separate network (approximately 170 miles (270 km) total length) of cycle and pedestrian routes – the redways – that runs through
5187-453: The grid-squares and often runs alongside the grid-road network. This was designed to segregate slow moving cycle and pedestrian traffic from fast moving motor traffic. In practice, it is mainly used for leisure cycling rather than commuting, perhaps because the cycle routes are shared with pedestrians, cross the grid-roads via bridge or underpass rather than at grade, and because some take meandering scenic routes rather than straight lines. It
5278-482: The iconic Concrete Cows at Milton Keynes Museum . Milton Keynes is among the most economically productive localities in the UK, ranking highly against a number of criteria. It has the UK's fifth-highest number of business startups per capita (but equally of business failures). It is home to several major national and international companies. Despite economic success and personal wealth for some, there are pockets of nationally significant poverty. The employment profile
5369-524: The intention that it would be self-sustaining and eventually become a major regional centre in its own right. Planning control was taken from elected local authorities and delegated to the Milton Keynes Development Corporation (MKDC). Before construction began, every area was subject to detailed archaeological investigation: doing so has exposed a rich history of human settlement since Neolithic times and has provided
5460-525: The landscape of south-central England. There is evidence of Stone Age , late Bronze Age /early Iron Age , Romano-British , Anglo-Saxon , Anglo-Norman , Medieval , and late Industrial Revolution settlements such as the railway towns of Wolverton (with its railway works ) and Bletchley (at the junction of the London and North Western Railway with the Oxford–Cambridge Varsity Line ). The most notable archaeological artefact
5551-476: The last of the British New Towns, Milton Keynes has 'stood the test of time far better than most, and has proved flexible and adaptable'. The radical grid plan was inspired by the work of Melvin M. Webber , described by the founding architect of Milton Keynes, Derek Walker , as the 'father of the city'. Webber thought that telecommunications meant that the old idea of a city as a concentric cluster
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#17327802191815642-528: The leisure centres outsourced to commercial providers. As in most parts of the UK, the state secondary schools in Milton Keynes are comprehensives , although schools in the rest of Buckinghamshire still use the tripartite system . Private schools are also available. The Open University 's headquarters are in the Walton Hall district; though because this is a distance learning institution,
5733-666: The modern settlement. After the Norman conquest, the de Cahaignes family held the manor from 1166 to the late 13th century as well as others in the country ( Ashton Keynes in Wiltshire, Somerford Keynes in Gloucestershire, and Horsted Keynes in West Sussex). The village was originally known as Middeltone (11th century); then later as Middelton Kaynes or Caynes (13th century); Milton Keynes (15th century); and Milton alias Middelton Gaynes (17th century). The area that
5824-465: The more conventional radial pattern found in older settlements. Major distributor roads run between communities, rather than through them: these distributor roads are known locally as grid roads and the spaces between them – the neighbourhoods – are known as grid squares (though few are actually square or even rectilinear ). This spacing was chosen so that people would always be within six minutes' walking distance of
5915-501: The need for any scaffolding. The interior of the building would take just two weeks to complete. The first houses went up for sale in Spring 2007. There have been problems with the design and manufacture of the houses. The problems have included the following: Milton Keynes 52°02′N 0°46′W / 52.04°N 0.76°W / 52.04; -0.76 Milton Keynes ( / k iː n z / KEENZ )
6006-473: The only students resident on campus are approximately 200 full-time postgraduates. Cranfield University , an all-postgraduate institution, is in nearby Cranfield , Bedfordshire. Milton Keynes College provides further education up to foundation degree level. A campus of the University of Bedfordshire provides some tertiary education facilities locally. As of 2023 , Milton Keynes is the UK's largest population centre without its own conventional university,
6097-534: The original six towns (Bletchley, Fenny Stratford, Newport Pagnell, Stony Stratford, Wolverton, and Woburn Sands ) was largely rural farmland but included many picturesque North Buckinghamshire villages and hamlets: Bradwell village and its Abbey , Broughton , Caldecotte , Great Linford , Loughton , Milton Keynes Village , New Bradwell , Shenley Brook End , Shenley Church End , Simpson , Stantonbury , Tattenhoe , Tongwell , Walton , Water Eaton , Wavendon , Willen , Great and Little Woolstone , Woughton on
6188-512: The parish was abolished and became an unparished area of the Milton Keynes district. The town is served by Bletchley railway station , on Sherwood Drive, which is on both the West Coast Main Line and the Bletchley-Bedford Marston Vale Line , a constituent part of the former Oxford-Cambridge Varsity Line that closed in 1967. However, a major project called East West Rail is underway to rebuild and reopen
6279-401: The planning and development of Milton Keynes and has an associated research library. The centre also offers an education programme (with a focus on urban geography and local history) to schools, universities and professionals. Bletchley Bletchley is a constituent town of Milton Keynes , Buckinghamshire , England. It is situated in the south-west of the city, and is split between
6370-436: The residential tower block concept that had become unpopular , they set a height limit of three storeys outside Central Milton Keynes . Facilities include a 1,400-seat theatre, a municipal art gallery, two multiplex cinemas, an ecumenical central church, a 400-seat concert hall, a teaching hospital, a 30,500-seat football stadium, an indoor ski-slope and a 65,000-capacity open-air concert venue. Seven railway stations serve
6461-729: The rest of the city) and H8 Standing Way ( A421 ) (which runs westwards towards Buckingham , the M40 and Oxford , and eastwards through the south-east of the city crossing and connecting to the M1 at Junction 13 and running towards Bedford , the A1 and Cambridge ). The A5 passes along the eastern flank of Fenny Stratford, connecting it and Bletchley with the city centre, the A509 , A422 and A508 roads . The A4146 southern bypass serves Water Eaton , Newton Leys and Fenny Stratford. Watling Street, originally
6552-454: The route to the west of Bletchley to Bicester Village via Winslow ; the line from Bicester Village to Oxford has already been rebuilt. Eventually, full services through to Cambridge are planned. Major Milton Keynes grid roads serving the town include Watling Street (which has the V4 designation between Denbigh North and Stony Stratford ), V7 Saxon Street (connecting Central Bletchley with
6643-472: The strategic and financial case to relocate [from] the OU's existing campus at Walton Hall to a new site adjacent to the central railway station" and possibly commence teaching full-time undergraduates. Through Milton Keynes University Hospital , the city also has links with the University of Buckingham 's medical school. Milton Keynes City Discovery Centre at Bradwell Abbey holds an extensive archive about
6734-563: The substantial urban growth in the town in the Victorian period. It expanded to absorb the village of Water Eaton and town of Fenny Stratford . Bradwell is a traditional rural village with earthworks of a Norman motte and bailey and parish church. There is a YHA hostel beside the church. Bradwell Abbey , a former Benedictine Priory and scheduled monument , was of major economic importance in this area of North Buckinghamshire before its dissolution in 1524. Nowadays there
6825-565: The then president of the Royal Town Planning Institute , Francis Tibbalds, described Central Milton Keynes as "bland, rigid, sterile, and totally boring." Michael Edwards, a member of the original consultancy team, believes that there were weaknesses in their proposal and that the Development Corporation implemented it badly. The geography of Milton Keynes – the railway line , Watling Street , Grand Union Canal , M1 motorway – sets up
6916-667: The time is nearby Fenny Stratford. The Bletchley area is rich in Oxford Clay , which has long been used for bricks. Brick-making has taken place on the Newton Leys site and the surrounding area from the late 19th century, circa 1897. Bletchley Brickworks closed in September 1990. In the urban growth of the Victorian period brought by the railway, the town merged with Fenny Stratford. The latter had been constituted an urban district (with Simpson ) in 1895, and Bletchley
7007-486: The village has reverted to its 11th century name of Middleton (Middeltone ). The oldest surviving domestic building in the area (c. 1300 CE), "perhaps the manor house", is here. Stony Stratford began as a settlement on Watling Street during the Roman occupation , beside the ford over the Great Ouse. There has been a market here since 1194 (by charter of King Richard I ). The former Rose and Crown Inn on
7098-520: Was a 19th-century New Town built to house the workers at the Wolverton railway works , which built engines and carriages for the London and North Western Railway . Among the smaller villages and hamlets are three – Broughton , Loughton and Woughton on the Green – that are of note in that their names each use a different pronunciation of the ough letter sequence in English. In early planning, education provision
7189-550: Was a continuous run from Fenny Stratford to Old Bletchley). Bletchley's boom came to an end when the new Central Milton Keynes Shopping Centre was built and commercial Bletchley has declined as a retail destination since then. The town's importance as a major hub within Milton Keynes and the wider region was recognised in March 2021 following a successful bid by the Bletchley and Fenny Stratford Town Deal Board, when MK City Council
7280-479: Was added in 1898. By 1911, the population of the combined parishes was 5,166 but the balance between them had changed: in that year, the name of the local council ( Urban District ) changed from Fenny Stratford UD to Bletchley UD. The 1926 Ordnance Survey shows the settlements beginning to merge, with large private houses along the Bletchley Road between them. In 1933, the newly founded Bletchley Gazette began
7371-557: Was being founded. Industrial development kept pace, with former London businesses relocating to new industrial estates in Mount Farm and Denbigh – Marshall Amplification being the most notable. With compulsory purchase , Bletchley Road (now renamed to Queensway after a royal visit in 1966) became the new high street with wide pavements where front gardens once lay. Houses near the railway end were replaced by shops but those nearer Fenny Stratford became banks and professional premises. At
7462-487: Was built in 1943 as part of the Bletchley Park estate and was used by the government as a meeting place by day and a music and dance venue by night. After World War II , the venue continued to remain open and played host to musicians such as Lulu and The Rolling Stones . In recent years, the building was slated for demolition after its closure in 2019. However, after residents and the local MP rejected calls for
7553-447: Was carefully integrated into the development plans with the intention that school journeys would, as far as possible, be made by walking and cycling. Each residential grid square was provided with a primary school (ages 5 to 8) for c.240 children, and for each two squares there was a middle school (ages 8 to 12) for c.480 children. For each eight squares there was a large secondary education campus, to contain between two and four schools for
7644-640: Was completed in 2009, replacing the original 1970s building. Stadium MK , home of Milton Keynes Dons is at the northern edge of the town. This area also contains what is known as the "MK1" shopping centre. This includes shops, restaurants, and an Odeon cinema (which moved to MK1 from The Point building in Milton Keynes Central in 2015). Bletchley is divided between three electoral wards of Milton Keynes City Council, consisting of Bletchley East (3 Labour), Bletchley West (2 Labour, 1 Conservative) and Bletchley Park (1 Labour, 2 Conservative), and
7735-458: Was first recorded in manorial rolls in the 12th century as Bicchelai , then later as Blechelegh (13th century) and Blecheley (14th–16th centuries). Just to the south of Fenny Stratford, there was Romano-British town, M AGIOVINIUM on either side of Watling Street , a Roman road . Bletchley was originally a minor village on the outskirts of Fenny Stratford, of lesser importance than Water Eaton . Fenny Stratford fell into decline from
7826-497: Was out of date and that cities which enabled people to travel around them readily would be the thing of the future, achieving "community without propinquity " for residents. The government wound up MKDC in 1992, 25 years after the new town was founded, transferring control to the Commission for New Towns (CNT) and then finally to English Partnerships , with the planning function returning to local council control (since 1974 and
7917-680: Was run by English Partnerships on behalf of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (now known as the Department for Communities and Local Government . The 10 sites chosen for the competition were in Leeds, Aylesbury Vale, Upton (Northampton), Newport Pagnell, Basingstoke, Maidstone, Hastings, Stone and Merton as well as Oxley Park, Milton Keynes. In November 2005, the successful bidders for the first four sites were announced, which included Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners as architects and George Wimpey as
8008-539: Was successful in securing an award of £22.7mn as part of the UK Government's "New Towns Deal", with the City Council focusing most of that money on Bletchley and Fenny Stratford. This led to the publishing of the Bletchley and Fenny Stratford Town Investment Plan (TIP), with the plan aiming to boost jobs, skills and connectivity in the area, and further invest in Central Bletchley (the town centre). Within
8099-538: Was the Milton Keynes Hoard , which the British Museum described as 'one of the biggest concentrations of Bronze Age gold known from Britain and seems to flaunt wealth.' Bletchley Park , the site of World War II Allied code-breaking and Colossus , the world's first programmable electronic digital computer , is a major component of MK's modern history. It is now a flourishing heritage attraction, receiving hundreds of thousands of visitors annually. When
8190-480: Was to be the biggest yet, with a target population of 250,000, in a ' designated area ' of 21,883 acres (8,855.7 ha). The name 'Milton Keynes' was taken from that of an existing village on the site. On 23 January 1967, when the formal "new town designation order" was made, the area to be developed was largely farmland and undeveloped villages. The site was deliberately located equidistant from London, Birmingham , Leicester , Oxford , and Cambridge , with
8281-458: Was to become Milton Keynes encompassed a landscape that has a rich historic legacy. The area to be developed was largely farmland and undeveloped villages, but with evidence of permanent settlement dating back to the Bronze Age . Before construction began, every area was subject to detailed archaeological investigation: this work has provided an insight into the history of a very large sample of
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